Nestled in a coastal corner of Darwin’s northern suburbs lies a patch of bushland that’s become the new home of a tiny, endangered bird.
Local twitchers believe the Gouldian finch migrated north to Lee Point in search of better habitat and breeding grounds.
In doing so, it’s become the mascot for a grassroots movement to stop a multi-million-dollar Defence housing project.
At a recent rally against the project in Darwin’s city centre, the colourful creature was plastered over T-shirts and hand-painted signs.
Graeme Sawyer from Biodiversity Watch said the unique creature has “really got its way into people’s hearts because it’s so colourful”.
“It’s a bird that has an enormous public profile and is super cute.”
Once found right across northern Australia, the most recent count of the endangered finch estimated there were fewer than 2,500 left in the wild.
No stranger to the spotlight, the finch has not only featured in a David Attenborough documentary but has also become the main attraction for twitchers in Darwin this dry season.
Mr Sawyer said he believed thousands of people have visited the area to catch a glimpse of the elusive bird.
“We estimate that over that period from sort of May till the end of August, there was over 10,000 visits to that space, and about 48 per cent of those would have been tourists,” he said.
